The present invention relates to a development supporting method and device for developing a signal processing program to be supplied to a digital signal processor (DSP) used in a signal processing system, and a signal processing device and method using the signal processing program developed by the same.
Recently, a broadcasting system designated as EDTV (extended definition TV; so-called "clear-vision") has been practically adopted to meet demands for high definition in television images. Furthermore, novel high definition broadcast by a MUSE (multiple sub-nyquist sampling encoding) system, which is a kind of HDTV (high definition TV; so-called "hi-vision"), has been proposed and is partially practiced. In the near future, EDTV II (second-generation EDTV) and digital broadcast are planned to be practiced. In accordance with such development, it is necessary for image signal processors such as a television receiver (hereinafter referred to as the TV receiver) and a video tape recorder (hereinafter referred to as the VTR) to cope with a plurality of broadcasting systems including the currently adopted NTSC (national television system committee) system. As a countermeasure, for example, a plurality of boards respectively corresponding to a plurality of broadcasting systems are built in a TV receiver so that a board to be used is selected in accordance with the broadcasting system of a signal to be received.
Such a conventional TV receiver, however, disadvantageously costs much because a plurality of boards are built in.
The present applicant therefore proposed an image signal processor with a low cost in Japanese Patent Application No. 5-84712 (US patent application Ser. No. 8/226,663). In this image signal processor, hardware is commonly used for a plurality of broadcasting systems, and the processing by the common hardware is conducted differently in the respective broadcasting systems by switching software to be used. As a result, image signals of different broadcasting systems can be appropriately processed.
When a signal to be processed is an image signal as in the aforementioned case, the image signal includes a control signal such as an interfield subsampling phasing signal. The content of the signal processing by the common hardware (signal processing unit) is required to be changed depending upon the content of the control signal.
As more and more signal processing systems recently include a DSP, a variety of development supporting methods and development supporting devices for supporting the development of a control program for a DSP or parameters for controlling a DSP (hereinafter referred to as the control data) to be used in the development of applications for the systems are proposed. For example, such methods and devices are disclosed in "PicPEn--A Programming Environment for Picot, a Real-Time Video Signal Processing System" (Television institute magazine), Vol. 44, No. 11, pp. 1570-1578) and Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 4-274518 titled as "Programming device for an image signal processing by DSP".
However, image signals and the like are input in accordance with a predetermined format in which image data and a control signal are located in a predetermined order, and hence, a developer for control data is required to sufficiently comprehend the format to generate the control data for a signal input unit for receiving an image signal. In the aforementioned development supporting methods and devices, signals composed of data alone are to be processed, and there is no description of the generation of control data used in a signal processing system for an image signal having a predetermined format.
Additionally, since the signals to be processed by the conventional development supporting methods and devices are composed of data alone and include no control signal, the application of these development supporting methods and devices cannot generate control data that can change signal processing by a signal processing unit in accordance with the content of a control signal contained in an image signal.
Moreover, although it is necessary to examine and evaluate a plurality of algorithm in order to generate appropriate control data, the aforementioned development supporting methods and devices can neither deal with nor examine various algorithm.